Recommending and Expostulating Since 2010

Travels in the South: Day Two!

We kicked off the day with coffee and an enormous bagel from City Lights Coffee on Market Street, conveniently situated across from our hotel. We then spent the rest of the morning wandering around the city, one of my absolute favorite things to do in Charleston.

The gorgeous and newly-renovated Dock Street Theater.

The Pineapple Fountain at Waterfront Park.

Beautiful Waterfront Park.

We headed back to Charleston Place just after noon so we could get to one of my must-have’s for this trip: the Lump Crab and Avocado Salad at the Palmetto Cafe. Charleston Place has two amazing restaurants: the uber-elegant Charleston Grill for dinner, and the more casual but scrumptious breakfast and lunch Palmetto Cafe. I highly recommend both, but back to this salad.

This. salad. is. amazing. Yes, it is $20+, but oh-so-totally worth it. It is a virtual tower of fresh lump crab meat and avocado, served with grilled squash, bibb lettuce, mango slaw with ancho chili honey, and tortilla strips. The flavors are so clear, crisp, and clean that it’s remarkable. It just might make you weep, it’s so good. And it can easily be shared with your companion, if you’d like, but it will not invite conversation as you will be too busy appreciating this food. This was my second experience with this salad, and it totally lived up to the memory I had of it. It will definitely remain on the list of must-have’s in Charleston.

With our tummies full, we hopped into the car to do a little driving tour of a few of the islands that surround Charleston. The Low Country is remarkable for the many islands and waterways that make up the coastline, and each island has its own character and attributes. We zipped over to Sullivan’s Island, a seaside town that reminded me of Montauk, NY, as well as Isle of Palms and Mt. Pleasant. We headed back to the hotel around 4pm to grab a couple of Pimm’s Cups at the Thoroughbred Club before getting ready for dinner.

We had an 8:00 dinner reservation at McCrady’s, but wanted to stop by S.N.O.B. for a quick drink before dinner since it’s another one of our favorite spots in Charleston. The bar was hopping, and after one fist bump from a 60-year old man and two dirty martinis later, we were on our way to McCrady’s. Dinner was everything we thought it would be (um, amazing), and I’ll dream about the beef tenderloin with duxelles and foie gras hollandaise (how ridiculously good does that sound??? and it was!) for many years to come.The hollandaise formed a fabulous crust over the top of the beef that made each bite sublime. The beef tenderloin also came with a small pot of the most luscious whipped potatoes we’ve ever had. Other dishes enjoyed at our table were the wild ramp pasta with braised lamb and San Marzano tomato ragout, the local shrimp and crab stew with Anson Mills grits and Benton’s bacon, the grouper with vidalia onions and brown butter jus, and some South Carolina peach cobbler to top it all off. YUM!

Fun fact: We later drove past the town of Vidalia on our trip through Georgia, and were tempted to go see if there were any onions but were on a timeline so pressed on. After some research we found out that Vidalia onions were first grown in Vidalia, but are now found all over Georgia. However, they’re only grown in Georgia! So that’s cool.

The Celtics game was entering the second half so we hightailed it over to the South End Brewery to watch it, then headed up to the Pavilion Bar on the rooftop of the Market Pavilion Hotel for one last nightcap. This is the spot where I fell in love with Charleston two and a half years earlier (the view is bananas), and it’s just a gorgeous spot in general. By this time it was after midnight in the Holy City, and it being a Sunday we decided to wander back along Market Street to Charleston Place. But not before we saw this guy working very hard: